Author| fig
Edit| Mia
"Chinese is to watch fairy tale dramas."
As a "unique variety" of domestic dramas, domestic audiences have always loved and hated their emotions for fairy tale dramas. Mythological beauty and chivalrous spirit give the protagonists omnipotent power, love and indispensable spiritual pull, to meet people's romantic imagination of love "purity, supremacy, supreme", as long as it is an S-grade large-scale production + configuration of eye-catching + exquisite costumes of fairy tale dramas, mixing a small "explosive" problem is not a big problem.
Last year, "Canglan Recipe" won out small orchids and oriental green cangs, and this year, fairy tale dramas are always one breath away from "explosive models": after "Starfall into Sugar" and "Heavy Purple", "Long Moon Ember Ming" has become the next "potential stock to be exploded" in everyone's hearts, and is a highly anticipated "first sight beauty". After all, whether it is the Dunhuang aesthetic style poster in the early stage of the series, or Luo Yunxi, Bailu Duo, and the god and demon sadomasochism with a sense of contrast, they are full of expectations.
Judging from the broadcast feedback of the first week of "Long Moon Ember Ming", the popularity of the drama has reached the top in recent online dramas, and it has been popular TOP1 on platforms such as Yunhe, Maoyan, and Bone Duo for many consecutive days, and the popularity in Youku station has exceeded 10,000, breaking the Youku popularity speed record, but the reputation is polarized, and the three-life relationship of the male and female protagonists attracts a fixed audience under a poignant and dark background, while the overall picture texture is online game style, the plot and character are not new, the actors are too thin, the makeup is not suitable and other hot discussions, and they are also continuing to ferment.
The appearance of "Starfall into Sugar" in Q1 this year's Q1 with light comedy, twin sisters and black lotus heroines breaking the routine has also brought some enlightenment to the industry, the "sadomasochism" mode of fairy tale dramas has fallen into the cliché, where is the way out and iteration direction of fairy tale drama 3.0?
Xian Xia drama three-board axe, can't escape the "routine" curse?
The popularity of fairy tale dramas all depends on three axes: serving the Tao, sadomasochism, and CP sense. The first hurdle, such as the fit of the actor's appearance with the type of drama and the role, is the first hurdle, movies such as Zhang Zhen, Chen Kun, and ancient puppet professionals such as Xu Kai have not escaped.
The first round of controversy in "Long Moon Ember Ming" comes from the continuation of this trend, as an ancient puppet fairy man in the impression of netizens, it can be seen that the male protagonist Luo Yunxi is remarkable in terms of micro-expression, body and line expression, but the emaciated face and the skeleton that cannot support the costume cannot allow the audience to match the actor and the character, coupled with the director's multi-angle overhead shot further highlights the shortcomings of Luo Yunxi's figure, which makes his CP sense with the heroine Bai Lu also discounted.
The eye-catching costumes of "Long Moon Ember Ming" are the result of the play's styling design Huang Wei going to Dunhuang to collect style, the pearl headdress of the mussel spirit played by Bai Lu, and the goddess style of Chen Duling have received a lot of praise. However, while sighing that "Long Moon Ember Ming" finally changed the "funeral style" of fairy tale dramas in terms of clothing, and had aesthetic advances and breakthroughs, it was found that the female protagonist's blackheads, card fans, and the male protagonist's heavy makeup and exaggerated eye shadow all stepped on the taboo of "fairy tale drama cheapness".
The Dunhuang series of posters that were once out of the circle is the most successful part of "Long Moon Ember Ming", and has also become the longest board of this drama, and now it looks very abrupt, which is very different from the poster look.
The pre-marketing of the male second Deng Wei and the female third grandson Jenny, the same as the effect of the poster, the feature film magically took away the stills and the aura in Reuters, even if it was recently played by Chen Duling, the second Tianhuan, the second female of the Buddha's mouth snake heart, so that many fans have "went up" to set up "Huanmen", playing the role terrier, you can see the progress of Chen Dulin's acting skills and the surprise of the ancient costume, but compared with the high hopes people placed on this role before the start of the series, it still seems to be more than enough and insufficient. It can be said that makeup, photography, lighting and post-production did not add points to the series.
In terms of plot, "Long Moon Ember Ming" caught up with the villain as the protagonist and blackened the limelight, the abandoned son of the first life counterattacked and ascended the throne as the king, and the domineering lady took the weak proton and other plots are somewhat innovative, which can attract the audience to chase down with doubts, but in the dream copy (the second life in other dramas), the male protagonist suddenly incarnated as the god of war and began to save Cangsheng, which is the old routine used by countless fairy dramas, and the "marriage first and then love" of the mussel spirit is also expected, "beautiful and strong" character and "fate" The plot inevitably recalls those classic fairy tales, and the bottom line is the homogenization caused by the lack of innovation in the basic mode.
The same character styling reflects the familiar plot of fairy dramas, from the pure little white flower who does not know the world to the ruthless counterattack after blackening, is the same psychological evolution of the protagonists, the same strong smoky makeup before Zhao Liying in "Flower Thousand Bones", followed by Li Randi and Yang Chao of "Starfall Condensed into Sugar" and "Heavy Purple", and we finally waited for Bailu's similar makeup in the latest episode of "Long Moon Ember Ming". And seeing Luo Yunxi's "Demon Venerable" is bound to be associated with Wang Hedi in "Canglan Recipe".
Regarding the special effects part of "Long Moon Ember Ming", there are mixed reviews, some people sigh that "the funds are burning" and "the special effects are very shocking", and some people think that a large number of fighting special effects and spells are blurred and dazzling, it can be seen that the crew spent a lot of thought on grand scenes such as the demon god destroying the world, but it was really unnecessary to drag it out for twenty minutes, and the audience could not directly drag the progress bar at double the speed.
The OST of the play is currently the most praised link, Mao Buyi, Liu Yuning, Zhang Bichen, Hu Yanbin, Huang Ling, Yuan Yawei, these OST gods collectively came out, and the 13 songs tailored for the series can be called "the top of fairy tale dramas".
When will the "rebirth" of fairy tale dramas arrive?
A few years ago, the audience was already tired of watching the same world view setting of fairy tale dramas and mythological dramas, but the main creators are still happy, the male and female protagonists save Cangsheng, the love of the three lives, the chaotic war in the four worlds, similar sadomasochistic routines and villains framed, "Long Moon Ember Ming" changed soup without changing medicine. Rich emotions, sadomasochistic post-BE aesthetic expression was once the killer of the fairy tale theme, and now it has become another limitation.
For example, in "Long Moon Ember Ming", the heroine Ye Xiwu witnessed the death and injury of her relatives, and did not show the grief of losing her relatives, many viewers questioned such a plot arrangement and actor performance, Bai Lu also mentioned in a recent interview that Li Susu knew that the death of her relatives five hundred years later was not the final end, so "as long as she works hard to turn things around, her relatives can be reborn."
This has become a bug in fairy tale dramas, anyway, there will always be reincarnation, so why care about the ending of the previous life? What is the meaning of all sorrow and joy and pain? When Bai Shao walks on the Immortal Terrace again and again and then repeatedly experiences the next life and rebirth, will anyone still be moved? Xiao Xia, an audience who loves BE aesthetics, said, "Now even if you see the male and female protagonists crying and heartbroken, you won't feel anything, anyway, there will be the next life." And under the blunt plot patchwork and divine logic, it is difficult to substitute into the protagonist's emotions. ”
As a popular genre in the market, the routine of fairy tale dramas is inseparable from the entire industrial chain from the IP end to the producer, publicity and market feedback. From the explosion of "Flower Thousand Bones" and "Three Lives and Three Lives and Ten Miles of Peach Blossoms", to the small explosion and virtual fire of today's fairy tale dramas, from the whole people chasing dramas to now mainly ridiculing and spitting, fairy tale dramas are worth taking out fewer and fewer samples, and the plot is lackluster, not to mention the classic characters that can be remembered.
At present, the popularity and ratings of S-grade fairy tale dramas are still there, but the glory is no longer there. Everyone has witnessed the process of the fall of martial arts dramas, and now the argument of "is there any salvation for fairy dramas" has also become very popular, and change seems to be imperative.
Previously, when entertainment unicorns interviewed Zhu Ruibin, director of "Fragrant Honey Sinks Like Frost" and "Starfall into Sugar", he talked about the future development of fairy dramas, he said that fairy dramas have been on the road of beauty, exquisiteness and gorgeousness for many years, and the audience has also been tired of watching the four worlds strife and gods and demons fighting, and the fairy dramas after that can try to do the opposite, go back to basics, and do not need to overemphasize stunts and spells, only use when necessary.
Drama market, calling for "pendant innovation"
Summarizing the female frequency dramas from 2022 to Q1 of 2023, realistic themes, life streams, and pastoral healing styles have gradually penetrated into various genres, costume dramas such as "Qing Qing's Daily", "Menghualu", "Star Han Splendid Moon Rising into the Sea", modern dramas such as "Go to a Windy Place", "I Heard You Like Me", "Love Only", "The Way Home", etc. have added elements such as "slow life", female group portraits, workplaces, etc., and fairy dramas such as "Canglan Recipe" and "Starfall into Sugar" are also praised for their picture texture and light comedy elements, respectively, "innovative" Be the keyword for 2023.
Judging from the performance of ancient puppets and fairy dramas in recent years, it reflects several trends, first, the aesthetics of senior Hong Kong and Taiwan directors and styling designs who used to operate fairy tales and ancient puppet dramas are separated from the current audience, and the awareness of innovation and change of mainland producers and creators is increasing, such as "Jiang Ye" and "Menghualu" directed by Yang Yang, "East Palace" and "Siten" directed by Li Muge are more in line with the implicit beauty of oriental artistic conception, and the director has quite ideas about the presentation of stories, costumes, pictures, and music, and has highly restored the famous scenes in the original work many times. Hit the audience's tears and Sue points.
Second, the effective use of special effects can add luster to the series, and last year's two hit dramas "Canglan Recipe" and "Tang Dynasty Mystery Record" showed the fantasy part and the use of special effects were more in line with the plot, even if they were not used on a large scale, they could get good feedback. Third, the narrative is clear and clear, and the motives and behaviors of the characters conform to realistic logic, such as the small and medium-sized dark horse dramas "Royal Gift" and "Youth Song Xing" can still stand out without starring stars.
There should be higher expectations under high specifications, S-class fairy dramas break the routine and find another way is imminent, from satisfying hardware, to cultivating internal skills, the market is calling for more innovative and craftsmanship "fairy tales", and in the second half of the year, 85 flowers Yang Mi, Liu Shishi, Zhao Liying collectively return to the field of fairy tales, whether they can bring the "spring" of fairy tale dramas, it will be waited.